Strangely enough, it appears that Woody Allen and John Turturro have a solid working relationship. Tuturro played a writer in Allen’s 1986 movie Hannah and Her Sisters, in which Allen won an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay. (He just won for Midnight in Paris.) Now Allen is set to return the favor, signing on to Fading Gigolo, a movie that Turturro is writing and directing. In addition, Turturro will pull triple duty and co-star alongside Allen in the film, following two broke friends who go into the gigolo business only to attract the suspicion of the Hasidic Jewish community in which they live.

It’s not a total dude-fest, though – this movie has found some leading ladies as well. Sharon Stone has signed on as Allen’s dermatologist who hires Turturro to sleep with her and “Modern Family” star Sofia Vergara is in talks to join as a wealthy bored housewife who wants a threesome with the leading men, who operate under the fake names Virgil and Bongo. Allen’s character pimps out Turturro until he falls for a Jewish widow, who hasn’t been cast yet.

As Variety notes, Fading Gigolo will mark the first time in over ten years Allen has acted in a movie he hasn’t directed, though this does sound pretty similar to the kind of material we’ve seen him churn out over his long career. I haven’t seen any of Turturro’s directorial work – the most prominent film he’s done is 2005′s Romance and Cigarettes – so I’ll be interested to see what kind of work he does behind the camera as well as in front of it.

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Italians in Film: The Project

Italians in Film is a project aimed at creating an environment where Italy and Hollywood can meet and share a common ground, thus building strong synergies with the local movie industry and the audience through the presentation of the best Italian film productions, its artists, and filmmakers.

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